Rise from the Clay
by I'm Iller
Summary: Some ficlets from a modern and on-going Assassin's Creed AU roleplay.
1. Genesis

By the time Altaïr, barely a teenager, reaches the northern city in America, it is already the dead of winter.

Snow blankets every inch of the place, and Altaïr likens it to the only thing he remembers from his restless days in Syria: the ochre sands of the silent deserts, the ones that stretch for miles beyond the sky-kissing towers of the compound. _The_ Compound, a cut-off section of tin and stone training boys to become killers, a dilapidated matriarch raising orphaned terrorists who will slaughter mercilessly for the sake of the Law, the Way, and the Truth.

This icy chaos, though, is not like the sands, and after his initial surprise at being capsulated in the powdery stuff, Altaïr's awe turns quickly to revulsion and loathing. Stepping out of the forest of concrete and into the open expanse of white park, he meets the wind head on, and it bites through what little clothing clings to his lean and wiry body.

In the city, it's cold, and it's dark, and it's quiet.

Tired from hunger, tired from running, he seeks refuge on a park bench, curls himself inward on it, inward into himself where the faint thrum of his heart (survive, survive, _survive_) is the only thing that can warm him. An ember in his soul, burning as bright as his eyes glow, keeps him alive just long enough to be found. It's destiny, or fate. It's something he can't quite grasp just yet.

The man melts out of the cold air like a black phantom, dressed from head to toe in the most expensive three piece suit ever made, and Altaïr, as he looks up, thinks he may be fond of the red tie perched over the black shirt and vest. Kneeling, the man's knees creak, but the sound is muffled by the snowy wind, and a hand is extended soon, a glove removed, the backs of a few fingers brushing Altaïr's feverish and blue skin below the scraggly hair. Snow has settled itself in a little blanket over Altaïr's body, and the man casually sweeps it away.

Time is distorted then, and Altaïr thinks later, when he opens his eyes finally, that he has maybe died. He's in the back of a car, in the lap of the man from earlier, the man who may be God. "Ezio," the man whispers. Altaïr believes suddenly that this may really be God, one who knows his blurred thoughts without effort, and he only half understands what this name could mean.

He knows he should be worried, but somehow he isn't. The man is warm, inviting, cradling him like a child, and the car is warm, and all Altaïr can think before the drowsy and fuzzy heat takes him again is that, if this is death, it's not so bad.


	2. Method and Madness

In the beginning, Ezio is unsure if he has saved an alien, or a boy.

Naturally, Altaïr starts out in his own bed, or perhaps the couch, but in the early hours of the night, Altaïr ends up in Ezio's bed instead. There is a shy quietness to Altaïr, and it lingers even in the cover of darkness as he scoots himself flush up against Ezio's broad shoulders and back. (Never in the front, Ezio remembers, and never on the chest, always the back.) There is only a lump Ezio can feel behind him, a curled and still slightly malnourished boy who will never put an arm around him, whose deep breathing can barely be heard over the buzz of silence, or the air conditioning's purr.

Mesmerized by the orphan with skin the color of cream-and-milk-coffee, the orphan who understands no English or Italian, muttering only occasionally in the drum beat language of the East, Ezio longs to hold and explore. Twinges of it come here and there, the longing, but the weight of it really settles over him during the hours when Altaïr huddles against him in the night. There is so much to know, to learn, Ezio thinks, if only he could map the pale saddle and cork flesh, feeling the scars he knows sit under the clothes, like the one on the lip, feeling the taut and lean muscles on the stomach and arms. It makes him sad, he realizes; he knows the boy isn't just any ordinary one from a terrible third world. The boy is a killer.

In the morning, Altaïr is gone.

At first, Ezio thinks that Altaïr has returned to his own bed, but when Ezio looks, he finds no lump below the sheets. Perplexed, Ezio checks the couch, and then the kitchen, the chairs, even below the bed too: no sign of Altaïr.

A bit of anxiety swells in Ezio's chest, making it tight and stiff, and he looks over his tracks again to see if Altaïr will seep out of the walls or floors like a ghost. Nothing. In desperation, Ezio checks the closet in the bathroom (he has already checked his and the guest room's closets) and, lo and behold, Altaïr is actually wedged on one of the shelves between a few rolled towels.

It's a strange sight, Ezio thinks: a half grown boy balled up on the lowest shelf, tucked back into the depths of darkness and wood, between some cotton, and Ezio isn't sure why Altaïr would even think to sleep in a place like this when there is something better, when there's a bed and a couch.

Of course, Ezio coaxes Altaïr out, but there's no reasoning behind either of them due to the language barrier. The day goes as planned, but the next morning, Altaïr is back in the closet; the day after is fine, but the next morning, Altaïr is in the bathtub instead; and a week later, the days are normal, but the next morning finds Altaïr again sleeping on the sturdy shelf in the closet.

Finally, Ezio gives into this madness and relents, has a little ventilation shutter installed on the door to the closet so that Altaïr can at least breathe if nothing else.

In time, Altaïr grows out of constantly sleeping in the closet or the bathtub, but there are times when something strange and otherworldly overwhelms him, plaguing his thoughts and his dreams with blood, and sand, and steel. Quietly, he will seek refuge in the dark void of the small closet, will hike his knees to his chest and just lie there, inhaling the scent of white oak and Downy while trying not to think about the howl of bullets and the smell of flesh and smoke.


	3. Blood, Earth, and Sea

The door opens, and Altaïr glances over his shoulder, fingers pausing with the desk ornament.

Two people enter, and, in hindsight, Altaïr knows he will never forget this day: two boys, as dark as mahogany or cherry wood, one a head taller than the other, but both looking almost like twins. The youngest one, smiling curiously and eagerly, has the most brilliant and surprising eyes Altaïr has ever seen—blue, all blue, swarming and sharp blue, and Altaïr worries he may drown in them, so he looks instead to the other boy, only to realize he may get consumed still by the burnt sienna he finds there waiting, the blood-and-earthy gaze of uncertainty and caution.

"Al-Sayf," Ezio says from the other side of the desk, motioning with a hand while Altaïr looks on. "Malik"—Ezio points them out—"and Kadar."

Kadar, the youngest, the one with those haunting blue eyes, steps forward enthusiastically. "Hello, it's nice to meet you finally," he says, and it's in the familiar bark of Arabic.

Altaïr is stunned, and his fingers release the Newton's Cradle, causing a loud clack of sudden noise when the metal orbs connect and transfer momentum. The familiar roll of Eastern names and his mother tongue are given to him like a dish of lemon pudding, sweet and tart all at once.

It had been so long since he heard words he understood, but now he doesn't quite know what to say. Kadar continues to smile encouragingly, intrigued; however, Malik, who stands behind, looks just as sour as ever.

"Hello," Altaïr tries timidly.

"He _does_ speak Arabic!" Kadar says in English, more to Ezio, and he pushes the few steps forward to close the distance between him and Altaïr and desk. "Oh man, we get to teach him English, don't we?" When he looks at Ezio, the man nods, and then Kadar turns around to grin. "Malik," he says, waving his brother over, "we're going to have so much fun. It's someone like _us_."

_Like us_, Malik thinks. Looking at Altaïr, who looks right back at him, Malik doesn't believe they are alike at all. Pale skinned and golden eyed, foreign even with the rumble of Arabic in the throat—no, Malik doesn't believe they are alike.

Not one bit.


	4. Love with Stars and Thorns

It takes years, but Malik and Kadar slowly teach Altaïr how to speak English. Both Al-Sayf brothers continue to attend school at Ezio's behest, but Altaïr remains in the familiar solitude of an Assassin, his shy and careful nature slowly dissipating into something more confident and arrogant.

"I remember being on the plane," Kadar says to Altaïr over the sound of the shower's spray, dark hair matted to his forehead, blue eyes like crystal treasures staring from the middle of teak wood.

Kadar knows his body is changing, and it makes him embarrassed under the gaze of his brother, who he fears, as they are bathing, will say something is not as it should be; he tenaciously forgoes any further hygienic adventures with Malik, much to the brother's confusion. With Altaïr, there are no obligations to become a perfect man because Altaïr isn't a perfect man either, and so Kadar often wiggles his way into the shower with the half-Arab with broken lips. It's a surprisingly chaste endeavor, craved for company.

"Malik says I wouldn't remember much because I was little, but I do remember some," Kadar is saying, leaning against the wall of the shower while Altaïr mechanically goes about washing that mousey-brown hair. "I remember the compound we were in. I remember them telling me, 'Take this knife!' and Malik wouldn't ever let me. He took it instead. I tried to ask him what the knife meant, what he had to do with it, but he won't ever tell me. I remember when we just… left. Malik just made us leave out of nowhere, dragged me Hell and a day to get to the nearest city. I thought we'd starve to death before we got there. I remember the plane was scary"—here, Kadar laughs—"and Malik says I cried the entire way from Syria to California."

Slowly, Altaïr looks up, but he doesn't say anything at all, head covered in suds. He thinks, for a moment, he has a sharp clench of jealousy, if that's what jealousy feels like at all. Kadar is lucky, he thinks too, bitterly, getting all of Malik's attention. After a moment, Altaïr gives Kadar a look that says to continue, and then he turns back to rinse his head.

Kadar, ever the talkative sweetheart, is obliging. "We didn't have anything but our clothes and a backpack. We slept wherever we could, but I don't think Malik really slept." Wryly, Kadar smiles through the humid steam of the shower, eyes watching the water swirl endlessly down the drain. "We would have died in California, two ratty things like us. Malik actually stole something. He stole quite a few things, and then pawned them, and then we got bus tickets to Georgia."

"You've been South?" Altaïr asks, intrigued, pausing and blinking his eyes to rid his lashes of water.

"Mhm," replies Kadar with another smile. "I loved it. Georgia was nice, especially in the country. Open fields, warm, tons of trees, horses—oh, and they have these peach farms, too."

Altaïr closes the distance from here to there, bunches Kadar into the wall, and Kadar doesn't refuse the assertive advance. "We'll go," Altaïr whispers, tilting his head and leaning it down, a thousand goose bumps not from the cold raised between them, on their skin like beach sand. "We'll go again together, to Georgia."

And then he's kissing Kadar, for the first time, a bit timidly, but he's thinking of Malik.


	5. Wood Touched by Fire

Many days, Kadar and Altaïr have passionate trysts in secret. Kadar swells with love and adoration, a pining and worshiping of Altaïr, idolatry at its finest. For Altaïr, the coupling is merely a way to extend his fantasies, the ones he has of Malik, though he slowly finds himself loving, in his own way, the blue-eyed Al-Sayf more and more.

Unfortunately, Malik has walked in on them.

First snow on the ground always excites Kadar to no end, and this year, first snow is deep snow. Malik opens the door to the bedroom with full intent to startle Kadar with the news, with an offer of adventure, only to find Altaïr taking great liberties with his brother's dark, bare body. The two of them freeze, and Kadar is immediately petrified and embarrassed. Altaïr is irate at best. Shock pours over Malik's face and, as he had come in, he exits: exhaling sharply, pulling the door closed with purpose.

Kadar calls after him, but he is well through the other side of the apartment by the time the bedroom door opens.

Malik finds himself outside in the snow, running through it, lungs burning, letting the ice slap him in the face as it comes down in heavy sheets to cover the man-made world in innocent white. He is ashamed he could not protect his brother's purity despite how hard he tries, and he tosses himself into a snow bank, letting his body roast from the inside and sink him down into the cover of cold.

Without knowing or realizing, Malik becomes jealous.

The jealousy grows the more missions they take together here and there. Malik can hear them under the sheets on the floor. Malik can hear them in the bed of the truck while he is in the cabin. Malik can hear them in the shower, on the couch, in the kitchen, in the next room, in his dreams.

In the end, Kadar knows. In a way, it pains him terribly. To Altaïr, he is only second best compared to the mystery of his brown-skinned sibling.

Altaïr whispers out Malik's name accidentally while they are making love, and Kadar can easily see the way his brother looks at Altaïr with envious contempt. It takes some courage, but he finally tells Malik, "He's in love with you." In the dark of the bedroom, neither him nor Malik stirs, and there is deafening silence.

"He loves you."


	6. The Evil That Men Do

A few weeks into autumn, Kadar insists on becoming a fledging Assassin, and Malik continues to deny the request even when, in the end, the decision is not his at all. (Malik is _certain_ this idea has been instilled by Altaïr.)

Kadar is inducted as a novice and, like his brother and his idol, he never returns to school. Now he learns to write with a blade and a gun, inking the walls and floors with an enemy's blood. Now he does one hundred push-ups instead of figuring the square root of x. Now he learns to dismantle a rifle instead of learning the capitals of the world.

Malik is not happy about this change in his little brother.

The time the three of them spend together, swirling in the art of hidden warfare, they are the closest they have ever been, yet Malik feels as lonely as ever, as does Altaïr, as does Kadar. Malik doesn't like the bruises Kadar has from training; he prefers the blisters of heavy writing with pencils on Kadar's fingers to pockets of blood beneath the skin from punches and tosses. Altaïr returns to sleeping in the closet here and there when he isn't trying to weasel into bed with Malik and Kadar.

At night, Malik has to become The Storyteller. Even if he has no books, they beg and beg for him to tell them a story, something grandeur, something exciting or adventurous, and, sometimes, something terrifying and scary.

Then one night, Kadar whispers, "Tell us a story about our parents."

Neither Altaïr nor Kadar are ready for such a secret, and Malik has kept it long enough to know he can keep it until his dying breath if it comes down to it. Thinking of their father burns shame under Malik's skin, and there's not much he knows about their mother aside from her dark hair and quiet voice. Instead, he tells them the rest of the story of the great Gilgamesh and Enkidu, one of his favorites from high school, one he ventured to read on his own time again and again. Kadar and Altaïr don't ask for a story about parentage again.

A year later, Ezio sends Altaïr and Malik on a mission, suggesting they take Kadar along for the experience.


End file.
